Trophy means everything to Noves

Noves led the French giants to a fourth European crown thanks to a 21-19 win over Biarritz Olympique and the highly-respected veteran admits that victory in the continent's premier competition was the be all and end all this season.

Toulouse rested a number of senior players for their domestic semi-final defeat to Perpignan, with Saturday's Parisian spectacle taking priority for the 1996, 2003 and 2005 champions.

"It's been very tough balancing the Top 14, European Cup and international matches," said Noves.

"We'd said that our priority this season was the European Cup and we've fulfilled our contract. We gave it all for this.

"It means everything to our club, our youngsters.

"It's thanks to good recruitment, and really is the fruit of 50 players and down to the quality of assistant coaches and all back-room staff."

Toulouse appeared to be cruising to a well-deserved victory at the Stade de France as they led 21-12 with just seven minutes remaining thanks to the boots of David Skrela and Florian Fritz and a superb performance in the scrum.

But a converted Karmichael Hunt try made for a nail-biting finale, with Noves' left a little nervous in the closing few minutes.

"It's true that we were left shaking at the end when they scored since we'd largely dominated the game up until then," admitted Noves.

"Our scrum's been great all season long. We dominated that phase of the game.

"But we also have a gameplan based around speed and movement, and there was frustration for the players that they weren't rewarded as the final pass often went begging."